Why did the kid’s get a peanut butter sandwich, an apple, and a glass of milk for dinner?

The past couple of months have been super busy. In addition to the craziness raising 7 kids involves, Michael has been gone a lot and hasn’t had a day off in a long time. We are proud that he has been able to help so many people during all of the natural disasters lately and bringing our troops home to their loved ones. It is tiring though for both of us. When he is working and away from home, I am picking up all the household duties, kid raising, yard work, going to school full-time, running kids to swimming-dance-karate- and basketball, taking Conner to and from school, my homework, Conner’s homework, errands, and more. Basically, holding down our fort.

Sunday, I prepped for the impending Hurricane Irma. I brought everything inside from outside, did the yard work, cleaned the house, prepped the generator, gave the kid’s a full kid’s spa at home (mani’s, pedi’s, baths, hair styling, etc.), went grocery shopping, did all the laundry, and stocked up the house with necessities.

Conner went with me grocery shopping. Somehow whenever he shops with me random junk ends up in the cart! Does anybody else have this mystery? He doesn’t get to go shopping too often with me because I usually go when he’s at school so I guess this mystery is ok.

Why is it that the moment your spouse comes home from a trip, the clean house suddenly gets destroyed in minutes?

Sunday evening, Michael came home from work so we did a quick birthday celebration with him. After all, it was his 29th birthday and we still needed to celebrate his promotion earlier that week! We had his favorite, Key Lime Pie and the kids all sung happy birthday to him. We did his laundry from his return trip and he packed for the next day. After that, my mom came over to watch the little ones as Conner, Michael, and I went to The Melting Pot for dinner. This is always one of our favorite, treat celebration restaurants.

Michael left really early to go pick up troops from the Middle East. He should be back in a few weeks. The kid’s and I had a fun pj day since we were getting a lot of rain from Hurricane Irma. Our power kept coming on and off. I moved the kids from the main level of our house to the basement before bed time. With the creek and driveway flooding in our front yard and the fact we already had some trees fall down, I was worried about a big tree falling on our house.

This was the first time the kids have seen all of the hard work Michael has been doing on finishing our basement the last few months. It is coming together and a progress video will be soon. The reason it has been taking him a few months is due to the fact he has little time to work on it with his work schedule. The kids loved their CordaRoy’s beanbag beds! They could cuddle up when they were beanbags and turn them into beds when we went downstairs. Get yours here: http://cordaroys.com/?acc=a1d0c6e83f027327d8461063f4ac58a6

Healthy snacks and lots of books for the win!

All the kids wanted was their beds to sleep in and routine followed. They were so confused. Needless to say, Monday night and Tuesday night I was awake all night trying to be everything for all of them. I am so grateful the creek stopped flooding, and no trees fell on our house or van. The yard looks like a disaster with leaves everywhere, and random big trees that fell down. I will be cleaning it up this weekend. We have continued prayers for all those hit way harder than us by recent natural disasters.

Wednesday and Thursday involved me having 12 hours of class, 1.5 hr drives each way to/from class, and us having no internet and sporadic electricity from the storms. My mom was awesome and even took the kids to karate class since I was not home yet! She cracked me up when she said it took her 3 hours to get them ready for a 30 minute class. Yep, welcome to our crazy life :). Michael’s Dad was great and helped by taking Conner to school those days so my Mom wouldn’t have to add that craziness in too.

Thursday afternoon, we still had no internet. I have online components to my classes. I am half way through the 1st session of this semester, and somehow (through hard work and sleepless nights), I still have A’s in all of my courses. The only logical thing to do to get my assignments done and submitted is to load up all 7 kids and head to Starbucks so I could use their wifi. Only 3 kids were fans of the pumpkin flavor, but regular milk was a huge hit by all :).

Friday, the kids all woke up congested, coughing, have fevers, and colds. I think the busy few weeks, exposure to lots of new things, and weather changes are to blame. These little ones are grumpy and are really into snuggling. I have scrubbed the house, carpets, and have essential oils humidifiers going like crazy to try to help everybody. One sick kid is a lot of work for a parent. 7 sick kids and 1 parent is a whole new level of chaos. You’ll find me cuddling and comforting them all since they have learned how to all lay around me and still each be touching me.

Friday night, for dinner, the kids each had a peanut butter sandwich, an apple, and a glass of milk. Nothing fancy, but it is simple and balanced. We have made it through a week with lots of random things. We have thrived and will always survive.

Even though they fell asleep tucked into their toddler beds. By 11 pm, they all were cuddling each other on the floor. Yes, I was still up. Our internet had finally come back on and I needed to do more homework. Plus, I was able to finally Skype with Michael and find out about him and fill him in about the homefront. Total hours of sleep I logged this past week: 16 hours. People say I can’t do all of this or that I will reach burnout. However, I found out a long time ago, “when the going is tough, dig deeper, work harder, and have faith.”. We got this :).